Shadows and Regrets
by Tachibana Natsu
Summary: -One Shot- "-But he wasn't crying. Curiously, he felt too depressed to cry. Too hurt. Too shattered. Too angry. He was angry at everything; them for dying, the world for taking them away, but mostly himself, for not saving them. In days that had followed their deaths, he discovered that anger was easier to handle than grief, so he decided to be angry."


_**This takes place after the third's funeral**_

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Kakashi wandered aimlessly through the village, ignorant of the rain cascading down on him. The man paused in front of the entrance to Training Ground 7, his single dark eye studying the clearing. The silver-haired shinobi walked towards the Memorial Stone, when he reached it, he reached forward with a shaking hand and traced the names of the people who were once the most important people in his life... They had been more then friends, they had been a small, dysfunctional family. He looked at the names as he dropped to his knees. He had said horrible things to them. Tried to push them away after his father's suicide, so he wouldn't grieve if they died... Some plan that turned out to be. They had managed to worm their way into his carefully guarded heart with their warmth and their smiles, and then latched on, no matter how hard he shoved them away. And then they had been violently torn away one by one, leaving a hole in his heart. He wanted to let them go, to stop the pain. But he couldn't, the memories haunted his sleep...

Obito, crushed under falling rocks after saving him...

Rin, his own hand going through her chest and bursting out her back...

Sensei and Kushina-san, giant holes through their chests, giving their lives for their son they'd never meet...

Kakashi shivered. Red... Oh how he hated that colour. The colour of blood, of death, of the sharingan Obito gave him. He had only been a child when they were torn away from him, no matter how hard he argued it, he was only a child. They say time heals all wounds, that was a lie. It had been years since they died, and he was still in pain. It is useless for him to describe how terrible he felt in the time that followed. If you had ever lost someone very important to you, then you already know how it felt, and if you haven't, you cannot possibly imagine it. The loneliness ate you from the inside until only a shell remained. But grief makes a monster out of us sometimes . . . and sometimes you say and do things to the people you love that you can't forgive yourself for. Kakashi remembered being so horrible to everyone after losing his father, and when he finally started caring again, the world had to just tear it all away.

_I'm crying_, The 25 year old thought, looking from the Memorial Stone, to the grey sky as the rain pored down around him, _I feel like crying, so I must be crying... _But he wasn't crying. Curiously, he felt too depressed to cry. Too hurt. Too shattered. Too angry. He was angry at everything; them for dying, the world for taking them away, but mostly himself, for not saving them. In days that had followed their deaths, he discovered that anger was easier to handle than grief, so he decided to be angry.

He had been told to move on, by many. But where was he to move on too? He had nowhere left to go, no one to go to.

"Sensei?" Kakashi turned his head to see his young blond student standing behind him, and the jonin was struck speechless once again at how much the boy looked like his father, with his unruly mess of golden-blond spikes, and his deep azure eyes.

"What are you doing out in the rain, Naruto?" The boy's eyes narrowed,

"I should be asking you the same thing sensei. What are _you _doing out in the rain?" Kakashi paused, before swinging his gaze back over to the Memorial Stone,

"Running from the shadows and all the regrets." Naruto's head tilted to the side,

"Y'know, sensei. Grieving doesn't make you weak. It makes you human." Kakashi almost snorted, the kid was more in tune with other's than he let on. Naruto walked up beside him and Kakashi studied his student. There was too much black... It clashed with the boy's usually sunny personality. Naruto looked at his sensei, his blue eyes dark with his own grief. "How do you bear it?" The genin looked close to tears, much too close to tears for Kakashi's comfort, so the jonin turned his attention to the stone.

"I don't. I drag myself out of nightmares each morning to find there's no relief in waking. We're not strong enough to stand up against all the grief in our lives." He paused, "When someone dies, it tears a hole in your heart." The silver-haired man looked down at the blonde boy who reminded him of all the things he'd lost, "But, the hole in your heart is something other people can fill." He was such a hypocrite. He was giving this advice to the 12-year-old boy beside him, yet he couldn't even follow it himself... He-

"You're such a hypocrite, sensei." Kakashi thoughts stalled as Naruto stared up at him with hard blue eyes, "You should learn to follow your own advice." The jonin smiled gently,

"You're right..." He knelt down beside his student and pulled him into a tight hug, "And maybe it's about time I start." Naruto's arms came up hesitantly, before wrapping around his torso. The boy started to sob into his sensei's shoulders as the man held him securely in his arms. Naruto cried until he fell asleep and Kakashi continued to hold him. Standing up, Kakashi re-arranged the boy in his arms, and nodding a goodbye to the Memorial Stone, Kakashi walked away. It was about time he started letting others in, and he'd start with the little blonde boy who needed him most.

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_**Ya, kinda angsty... Got the idea from listening to **Shadows and Regrets by Yellowcard**, **Shattered by Trading Yesterday**, and **Let It Burn by RED**.**_

_**I hope you liked!**_

_**~Tachibana Natsu**_


End file.
